This article is part of my series, Recollections from 22 Years as a Father
Think Before You Act
When I started writing this article, my focus was strictly on the benefits of ignoring behavior. That is not the whole message. As parents, to help our children, we must focus on being selective and thoughtful when we approach them. If you insert yourself into matters that should be ignored, you create dependence and don’t build skills, like coping and confidence. On the other end of the spectrum, paying too little attention to serious matters opens opportunity to developing life-altering problems. You need to hit a happy medium. In order to do that, you must be selective and thoughtful in your approach.
I view my job as a parent to prepare my kids to be adults and to lead healthy, productive, and valuable lives. That preparation starts early and must be consistently applied until they declare their independence. My goal has been to help my kids think, explore and be responsible. Where you intervene in your child’s life, you create an imprint to their development. It is like in Back to the Future when Marty goes back in time. Once he dropped in and got involved, everything changed. So, before you make decisions about how things should go, my advice is to give thought if you should drop in and change things or you should stay on the sidelines. I am going to give you my thoughts on how you may want to think about doing that.
Use Goals to Focus your Response
Learning to discern when to ignore or respond to behavior will help children develop. Your decisions allow them to learn on their own and build independence. I encourage you to think about and document your goals as a parent. This may sound extreme, but raising children is an extremely critical thing to do and requires much thought. Don’t put more thought into your next vacation than how you will raise your children. If you do, your family vacations may not be so enjoyable.
Once you have goals clarified, use them to create a recognition mindset for each of your children. You can use this to engage your mind and not just react. This allows you to determining if, how and when to involve yourself in what is going on right now with your child. Each child will be different and require you to respond differently. My goal as a parent was to help my children develop 4 critical skills:
- Think critically
- Be empathetic
- Learn and explore
- Be responsible
I would expect you to have different goals as a parent. Whatever the goal, you will be more successful if you keep them front of mind and use them as a decision points. Using this framework, you focus yourself to play the long-game with your kids and pay less attention to the small stuff. You focus on having your actions work to achieve the goals you want to achieve.
5 Reasons to be Selective
Most importantly, I want my children to think on their own, develop their own opinions and listen to their conscience. If I am telling them what to do or forcing myself into their decision making, they will ponder what is right and develop their own perspective and unique viewpoints. I do not want to them to like something to please me or do something because it brings them attention. I hope they will pursue aspirations that intrigue them and push themselves to explore and learn. They may end up being completely wrong but I would rather them to discover that than for me to shoot it down for them. I think we all know what that feels like.
Second, selectively ignoring your child will help them understand that they are not the only person in the world. This doesn’t mean you don’t love them. It means the exact opposite. It demonstrates we all have multiple relationships and they all need to be nourished. When you grow up, you don’t see that. You are born into the spotlight and you think you are the sun. If you always remain in the spotlight at home, and then you go out into the world, you have a big surprise coming. By helping your child develop this perspective gradually, you can help them adjust to people as they get into school, jobs and the community.
Third, by approaching selectivity you will be helping to build self-reliance. Most people’s first instinct at the sign of trouble is to jump in and try to make the situation better. This may work short-term, but it fails long-term. The person being helped does not experience failure, nor the need to attempt to make something constructive out of it. In addition, they will not explore the alternatives. Some of my most valuable moments have come when I was stuck and needed to dig deep for a solution. Often, the first thing I tried did not work, so I had to experiment and try other stuff until I found a way free. This is critical to development. We would not have McGyver if everyone was continuously bailed out of problems.
Fourth, when I intervene, I want to help my child make a decision for which they are responsible. Sounds great but how does this work? Well, instead of coming in with a list of actions or making the decision for them, I would advise by asking them open-ended questions or giving them options. By not being directive or offering close-ended (yes/no) questions, you are putting them in charge. They have to weigh the options and make the decision. However it works, they will own the outcome and the consequences, good or bad.
Finally, by being selective, you child will appreciate your assistance more when you do intervene. They will recognize what you are providing, especially if you enter the situation with a “what can I do to help” posture versus you need to do this posture.
Start getting Selective today!
I want to inspire you to think about how your actions help your kids develop. You want a lifetime relationship with them, right? You control your side of the relationship. By being thoughtful and measured, you will have a much more profound impact on them when you do engage. When they feel the attention and realize the impact, they will desire to engage in this virtuous circle and build their self-esteem and confidence.
Your children are capable of handling a lot, probably much more than you think they can manage. Once they head out the door to play, go to school, go on a date, etc., you have to hope you have helped them prepare because you cannot be with them at all times. The decisions and actions you take when you are together will play a large role in how they learn to think, explore and be responsible in our great big world.
Get started today! Understand what you want to achieve as a parent and use that information as a framework for how you treat, educate, discipline, respect and love your children. It is a great gift you can give to yourself and them.